House Beautiful

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Let’s paint this room… turquoise!

AERIN Lauder colors

{image via Aerin Lauder}

When I rolled back into town and into the home I affectionately call “The Frat House” yesterday, I saw it with a fresh set of eyeballs and realized some SURRIOUS things could stand to change.  This is tricky considering a few factors:

a) I have to respect the fact that it’s not my house and I don’t have free reign.

b) Budget constraints.

c) Anything I invest in is subject to ruin… at the paws of my roommate’s adorable dog whose favorite pastime is puking (…maybe I’ll just forgo rugs?) and/or beer & wings getting flung onto things.  Gotta love boys.  The dining room is still holding up okay (my stuff overtook this space on move-in day…  whoops they’re welcome.)

Frat House Dining Room | Covet Living

So, there’s all that.  Common areas will be a challenge, so I decided to hire the local painters to start in my room… and there is no way to get more bang for your buck than a fresh coat of paint.  Plus painting is always a doodle that can easily be un-did, if need be.  My room is about a 10′ x 10′ shoebox space, and currently looks something like this:

Steph's Room | Covet Living

All the walls throughout the house are a sort of “contractor beige” at this point.  My bedding is all white (with the exception of the lilac & coral euro shams I made from a kantha I bought at Solo on Cedros in Solana Beach – diy on that soon – and the John Robshaw Jammu bolster from Bixby & Ball).  AND I would foam at the mouth to see my vintage Gerald Thurston lotus lamps pop against some pretty jewel tone….  like TURQUOISE!!*$^#^#@!!  Cuz hey.  Why the &%^$ not?  I just flipped back through my Color Palette board, and everything remotely close to that color is emphatically labeled: “This color makes me so happy!”  So there you have it.  This shoebox is about to transform into a little jewel box.

Perfect shade of aqua, via Sara Mueller Instagram | Covet Living

 {image via sara mueller’s insta}

The tricky thing will be picking the right shade of turquoise/aqua/blue…  I do also have these fellas in my room to work with:

(VIOLET RUG)

Steph’s Dining Room | Covet Living

…and that rug worked great with turquoise painted on the ceiling:

windsor-overdyed-in-stephs-dining-covet-living-510x680

(BRIGHT EMERALD DRESSER)

Note: This is an old photo from my Columbus house.  Details on that dresser redo here.

green dresser

So I don’t want to go all Pee Wee’s playhouse…  then again, Monica & Rachel did it in their apartment, so I might just throw caution to the wind on this one.  Plus Jamie Meares says we should #daretomix, and when she talks, I usually listen.  If this were my house-house, I’d probably being doing much more neutral, grown-up things, and I’d probably save the crazy for the powder room.  But in the spirit of the new year and of this being a color that makes me giddy, I say let’s just do it.

Friends Kitchen | Covet Living

I’m trying to hit on somewhere between a Caribbean-esque turquoise…

Pool Aqua Color Palette | Covet Living via Rue Mag
Turquoise Teacup | Covet Living

Turquoise Vogue | Covet Living

…and a bright, perky, pool blue.  Because the dresser is green, so I don’t want it to blend in with the wall.  I wouldn’t go as deep as the blue Carrie did:

Carrie's New Apartment | Covet Living

Maybe something like this?

Perfect Blue, Lisa Corti's Milan Apt | Covet Living

This blue is stunning too…

blue tile

{Image source unknown}

Or the color of this tile, which is a (lot) watered-down:

Blue Subway Tile

{Image source unknown}

The color in this hallway of the new HGTV Dream Home is close, but maybe a bit too green Tiffany’s Box aqua still:

HGTV Dream Home Wall Color | Covet Living

This is just about perfect:

Perfect Blue | Covet Living

Aqua matches | Covet Living

I’ll let you guys know how it turns out!

xoxo,

Steph's Scanned Signature

*Click on images for photo sources, unless otherwise noted.

 

Thanksgiving Goodness.

Happy Thanksgiving!!  Hope you’re posted up somewhere cozy like this today… sipping your morning coffee (or afternoon toddy)…

Inhaling something that smells like this…

Sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner at a table like this…

And wearing something like this…

As for me & Karrie (!)  …Let’s be honest.  It’ll be more along these lines:

Cramming as much turkey & cream-of-everything as we can in our little pot bellies… Probably watching this later…


And eating these Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Walnut cookies I just made:

…the batter bowl of which I just licked for breakfast – and washed down with half a can of French fried onions.  I so wish I were kidding.  I also wish My Fitness Pal app would stop asking me to log my breakfast.  It’s like the bastards know.

In any case… God, who doesn’t love Thanksgiving???  Can I rap a short list real quick about what I’m grateful for?

1.  Parents who kick ass. My sweet dad – aka Stevie B – who is like a cross between Elvis and a cowboy and a warm, fuzzy grizzly bear.  And my mom, who just sent me leaves and acorns and some other interesting treats in a care package, because she knows Fall is my favorite time of year at home.  The best part?  A “ps” in the card that said something like: “Helpful Hint!!  You can surround these cinnamon candles with the Fall foliage as a neat Thanksgiving centerpiece (!)”  Bahahah – Jayne.  God love er.

2.  Having had the gift of Grandparents…  the last of which, Bud, we just lost this Spring.  I was so lucky to have 3 of them I was close to for a very, very long time – well into my 30’s.  I don’t know many kids who are as lucky in that regard as I have been.  I feel like they taught me so many of the things I know – whether they meant to or not – about how to sew, how to bake Christmas cookies, how to build things… about what’s really important and how to be a good person to the people around you.  Now when I think back on my childhood and on the time they were all here, it almost feels like magic.  I miss sweet Bud, Ruth and Nanny Jam all the time, but I also kinda always feel like they’re still here.  And I’m so grateful for that, too.  Those are sweet Bud’s tooties under the Thanksgiving Day table at our house in Columbus 2 years ago.

3. OMG – GUS (!&$#^!!!) So grateful for the most insane, sweet pup full of unbounding joy who ever lived.  Did I tell you he’s flying home for Christmas with me?  Yep.  Pass the tranquilizers.

4.  Friends who are family. I’m lucky enough to have innumerable ones… including but not limited to that gaggle of hookers, my Burris K-12-ers, and my volleyball family.  I’m also grateful for my bestie and co-blogger, Karrie, whose fam I’m spending Thanksgiving with today.  This is what a lot of our snort-worthy convos look like:

5.  Living in this gorgeous place and finally having bitten the bullet and gotten out of my own way so I could start doing what I love this year.

Hope you guys have a GREAT holiday weekend with family & friends!!  Cheers to lots of naps, Scrabble and Christmas movies on TNT…  and decorating tomorrow.  OMG it makes me so happy I could pee.

Much love to you!